Supreme Court, Concerned Parents May Block Title IX Changes Coming to LASD

[XLFD]

On August 19th, 2024, the agenda packet of the Ludington Area School District (LASD) Board meeting has them looking at adopting a new policy, by having the first reading of new Title IX policies introduced by the Biden Administration, presumably so that they can adopt these at the next board meeting in September. 

The policy is printed in full in the packet, but if you haven't been following how the current federal administration is tweaking Title IX, which prohibits sex-based discrimination in schools that receive federal funding, it is now covering gender identity and sexual orientation as protected classes.  Legal experts claim that this would not only allow boys (and even men) at schools who claim to identify as female use women's restrooms and locker rooms and compete in women's sports, but also potentially sanction girls who are upset over seeing a biological male in their domain, shattering their records and invading their privacy that has been long established by having sex-segregated facilities for sports and bathrooms.

As a dad that had all four of my girls go to LASD when they were growing up, I would have yanked them out of any wacked out school that would pass such nonsensical regulations that affected their security and mental health.  

Last year, LASD caved into progressive culture and abolished prom standards that allowed for kings and queens, and it's not difficult to see why.  Their law firm (Thrun) and the state's educational czars reside in Ingham County where such bad policy originates from the environs of Lansing.  Their direction is to accept this progressive orthodoxy that allows biological boys and men in women's sports and locker rooms, and they are more than willing to adopt the mostly unpopular ideas when given the opportunity by the current administration.in Washington DC.

And yet, this injustice to women who want to compete with only women and shower with only women afterwards can be delayed until common sense comes back into vogue.  And that is because on this Friday, after the LASD sent out their agenda packet with the Title IX change therein, the US Supreme Court made a timely ruling that enjoins (stops) the implementation of the new policy due to some lawsuits filed against the new types of discrimination.

Now, some of our readers might have enjoyed watching male boxers beating the heck out of women boxers and see women weightlifting records get shattered by some dude who may honestly think they are a woman but should figure out they're not when they beat the old record by a hundred pounds.  You might not want to read further, for just one of our parents can stop this policy dead in its tracks.  And at least one is willing to come forward and do so.  Let's take a look at the ruling.

In an article on Friday in Education Week, not a conservative publication by any means, they broadcast a decision by the Supreme Court, that article follows, with highlights on the most relevant parts as pertains to this article:

The U.S. Supreme Court on Friday denied a request by the Biden administration to partially curb injunctions that are blocking its new Title IX regulation in 26 states and at least some schools in every other state.

In an unsigned opinion, the court said that the administration had failed to show that the bulk of the new regulation could be separated from three challenged provisions that newly define sex discrimination to cover sexual orientation and gender identity.

“On this limited record and in its emergency applications, the government has not provided this court a sufficient basis to disturb the lower courts’ interim conclusions that the three provisions found likely to be unlawful are intertwined with and affect other provisions of the rule,” the court said in its short opinion in Department of Education v. Louisiana and Cardona v. Tennessee

All nine members of the court agreed that the states and other challengers of the regulation were at least procedurally entitled to preliminary injunctions blocking the three key provisions, which include a definition of sex discrimination that includes gender identity.

However, four members of the court dissented over blocking the entire rule.

“Those injunctions are overbroad,” Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote in the partial dissent, joined by Justices Elena Kagan, Neil M. Gorsuch, and Ketanji Brown Jackson. “By blocking the government from enforcing scores of regulations that [states and others] never challenged and that bear no apparent relationship to [challengers’] alleged injuries, the lower courts went beyond their authority to remedy the discrete harms alleged here.”

The Supreme Court mulled the emergency requests for almost four weeks, and well beyond the Aug. 1 effective date of the new regulation interpreting Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, which prohibits discrimination based on sex in federally funded educational programs.

The court’s Aug. 16 action still leaves a confusing and disjointed map where the regulation—which for the first time explicitly protects LGBTQ+ students from discrimination—is in effect.

The emergency requests covered injunctions by two courts that completely blocked the new rule from taking effect in 10 states. Other courts have issued similar injunctions blocking the entire rule in an additional 16 states, and the Supreme Court’s decision will presumably keep those other injunctions in place.

One such injunction that wasn’t specifically before the high court, issued by a federal judge in Kansas, blocks the regulation in four states but is also in force at any school across the nation attended by the members of three groups that joined the challenge—Moms for Liberty, Young America’s Foundation, and Female Athletes United. Those lists include schools in all 24 states not covered by a statewide injunction.

That injunction significantly expands the geographic scope of where the new Title IX regulation is blocked. And the list of schools subject to that injunction is growing and includes at least a few schools in every state plus the District of Columbia. The Kansas judge has allowed those groups to recruit new members and add their children’s schools to the list.

There was no immediate reaction from the Biden administration, but U.S. Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona on Aug. 1 told stakeholders in a webinar that he “loudly and unapologetically” rejects the “politicization” of the regulation.

U.S. Solicitor General Elizabeth B. Prelogar in July asked the high court to allow most of the Title IX rule to take effect on Aug. 1, even as the Biden administration went along with pausing some challenged provisions that touch on gender-identity discrimination.

The Education Department regulation clarifies for the first time that Title IX protects students based on sexual orientation and gender identity. It also expands protections for pregnant and postpartum students, offers stronger language about retaliation, and sets out new grievance and due process procedures.

“Most of the rule does not address gender identity,” Prelogar said, citing the other provisions.

The solicitor general told the court the administration was OK, for now, with allowing the injunctions to block two provisions that deal with gender identity while it continues to fight them in appeals courts. One of those deals with restrooms, locker rooms, and other sex-separated spaces in education, making clear that transgender students may use restrooms, for example, that align with their gender identity. The other provision Prelogar was fine with leaving blocked clarifies that “hostile-environment harassment” in schools would cover gender identity.

But Prelogar did seek to halt the injunctions with respect to the broad new definition of sex discrimination to include gender identity.

The states and others challenging the new regulation argued that the new definition pervades the entire new regulation and provisions could not be easily separated into what could take effect and what could not.

“The states challenged the whole rule” and “are injured by the whole rule,” the state of Tennessee said in a Supreme Court filing.

On those points, the Supreme Court majority appeared to agree.

“The government [has not] adequately identified which particular provisions, if any, are sufficiently independent of the enjoined definitional provision and thus might be able to remain in effect,” the majority said in its unsigned opinion.

The majority noted that the 6th Circuit has expedited its consideration of the merits arguments in the Tennessee-led case and has scheduled oral arguments for October.

“The court expects that the Courts of Appeals will render their decisions with appropriate dispatch,” the Supreme Court opinion states.

In her nine-page dissent, Sotomayor outlined the significance of some of the provisions the solicitor general sought to make effective now, including the pregnancy and retaliation provisions and language that bars schools from “from making a preemployment inquiry as to an applicant’s marital status and limits the circumstances under which a school may make a preemployment inquiry as to an applicant’s sex.”

“At this juncture,” Sotomayor said, “enjoining the application of any other part of the rule needlessly impairs the government from enforcing Title IX and deprives potential claimants of protections against forms of sex discrimination not at issue in [the challengers’] suit.”

In Ludington, we have a mom who is a member of the "Moms for Liberty" group and she does not want this radical version of Title IX coming to her school or county.  This is enough to quash this policy going through for the time being at LASD, and we have similar aims to block this in other area schools.  If you have a similar view to the Ludington Torch or this mother, you may wish to join Moms for Liberty and protect our children from this ideological idiocy.  

The home page has a "join the fight" tab that goes to a page to further explain the original ruling:  "

The Department of Education’s Title IX rule was halted by a judge in federal court, prohibiting the new rule from applying in certain states as well as EVERY SINGLE SCHOOL attended by the children of Moms for Liberty members.

Becoming a national member at large of Moms for Liberty is FREE and ensures your child’s school is included in this exemption. Sign up below and select the “Member at Large” membership.

Read more about the ruling HERE.

The Ludington Torch is contacting the school board and superintendent of LASD to notify them of the SCOTUS ruling this Friday and if they don't take the first reading of this bad policy off the agenda, we will also notify them that one of the members of M4L has a student in the district and remind them of the injunction that applies.  

[Willy]

Thanks for posting this topic X. I might be dumb as a rock because I cannot make much sense of this entire situation. What exactly is this about? I know Biden's handlers have changed Title 9 but what exactly are they trying to change? It sounds like the Mad Hatter is trying to change and justify the meaning of his Tea Party while explaining how rational the Queen of Hearts acts.The fact that the U.S. Supreme Court is wasting it's time on this insanity shows how mentally twisted the left is. If someone wants to say they are a female when they are not then go ahead but don't make the rest of the World go along with your delusion. This is like a blind person telling you that you must except the fact that your red car is really blue and if you don't then you will be sent to a rehabilitation camp. This is nuts. The school board is nuts for going along with it. People who vote for these nuts are nuts. 

[XLFD]

Simplifying, Title IX was created to prevent sex discrimination in school/college sports and promote equity in athletic programs.  In sports that both sexes could play, like basketball, this involved segregating the sexes and allowing them to compete against other schools' segregated sex teams.  The fairness was obvious from what happened before, in that a school's team would feature only boys since they were (on average) better at B-ball due to natural factors that are based on their XY chromosome biology, such as height, strength, aggressiveness, etc.

The administration thought it could be further improved by defining sex discrimination to include those with gender identity issues-- which is where everybody gets confused, other than those with gender-confusion already.  It's madness, it's a situation where you, I or any school official would get legally pursued for stopping a 40-year-old pervert guy from entering a locker room and showering with minor girls because he says he identifies as a girl and you're violating his right to shower with his own sex.